__________________Everyone deserves a family, and Everyone deserves to be loved, and feel loved. 2 girls in my arms, and a son forever in my heart, and a rainbow baby coming in Nov!!http://lavenderdilly.wordpress.com/

exactly. DH and I are married. we did it for ourselves. it was simple, non-religious, unexpensive and beautiful. annnddd...i dont even know where our marriage certificate is. and my wedding "ring" is a living, breathing horse. lol.

WOO!! lol. Yes! We are married at heart, and common law. We have a beautiful daughter together and our own place. We never had a wedding or got rings or anything! Who friggin cares! His mean old mom thinks you HAVE TO have a stupid piece of paper to be in love or do ANYTHING together! PFFFT! lol she can kiss my butt! We have been together 4+ years and if we say we are "married" then bygolly, we are MARRIED! Paper degrades, burns, crumples, but our love is forever!

Staying unmarried isn't a guarantee that you wiill "never go through that." But, I understand your point. Just had to say it though. Happily married with a mortgage, 3 years (5 if you count the time we werent't marriied) 2 kids later and still very much in love. Feeling lucky every day because each day is a choiceand each day, we choose each other.

Staying unmarried isn't a guarantee that you wiill "never go through that." But, I understand your point. Just had to say it though. Happily married with a mortgage, 3 years (5 if you count the time we werent't marriied) 2 kids later and still very much in love. Feeling lucky every day because each day is a choiceand each day, we choose each other.

Agree and happily married for almost 20 years with a mortgage, although I agree with overpriced wedding comments

Just want to say that everyone that gets married doesn't have a fancy expensive wedding. We went down to the courthouse to file for a marriage license, found out you could just do it then (the ceremony) so we went down in regular clothes with just our DS in his stroller and got married. It was super simple, and very inexpensive. I just wear my engagement ring as a wedding ring (I don't need or want two rings) and DH got a wedding band that is nice but wasn't too $$.

Also, not all marriages end in divorce. I've seen just as many people break up and split that weren't married as are married. It just makes it a little easier I suppose not having to actually file for divorce, etc, but once kids are in the picture a split isn't going to be any easier really.

There are certainly benefits that come with that little piece of paper. For starters, in our case, DH's health insurance is really good and I am basically just a SAHM with an enjoyable but not high paying PT job. When we have a second child, I'll go back to being a SAHM for awhile again. Private health insurance costs a fortune if you don't want insane deductables and coverage for everything. I didn't have health insurance after DS was born almost two years ago and it sucked and is nerve wracking wondering about the what if's.